In Between
by emeraldteardrops
Summary: Summary: We all fight for what we want, not all of us get it.
1. Chapter 1

A/N Warning, character death.

**In Between**

Mikey hit Leo today.

It wasn't in practice and it wasn't playful sparring. It was without warning but they had all seen it coming. Well, everyone but Leo had seen it coming. Fearless had been oblivious, all the way up to the point where Mike's fist connected with his jaw and sent him flying back into the refrigerator. Leo's shell had hit so hard that it dented the fridge door inwards. He had remained motionless, arms outspread for a long stunned moment. Then his eyes had narrowed, ice cold fury shining bright, and he straightened. Leonardo would not throw the second punch, giving his brother the chance to step away from this. To an outsider it might seem stoic and honorable. They knew better. It was Leonardo's excuse for what was about to happen next. If one of them chose to push the issue, then the eldest felt justified in exerting his authority. Usually that authority hurt a lot.

Mike should have walked away, they could see it in his eyes that he knew it too. But he couldn't. That was the damndest part of all this. There was nowhere to go down here, there was no way to circumvent the authority that their world had been built around. Not even Raph could break free of it, and even though he spent many nights on the receiving end of Leo's fists, fighting for some kind of escape, he too was still here. Splinter had made the rules and set Leonardo as the enforcer. It was a role the Leo had not always done well, but he had since forged himself into a wall so strong that they never even had a chance to get past him. Right or wrong, they had watched in silence as Mike stood trembling in front of their brother, afraid but too strong and too proud to step down. He'd known it was going to hurt. To him it was worth the pain anyways.

"I'm going, Leo," Mike'd said through gritted teeth. "I have to."

"No, you're _not_." The eldest conveyed more than the command in his words. A master of intonation, a few syllables from his mouth could fill them with courage or could bring them to their knees in shame. He wielded that skill mercilessly, a club that beat them down, forcing them to obey.

Down here it was only them and their constant power struggle, who wanted it, and who was it. Leonardo _was_ the power. He was what they needed to survive in a world that could never accept them. He was beyond the loneliness that constantly pressed at them from all sides, making their small world smaller by the day and luring them to the surface. And ruthlessly he forced them to remain where they were, a barrier between them and city that called to them. He was the blocker, the scapegoat, something to rage against and fight when they wanted so much more than they were being allotted here. They had brushed the outside with the lightest touch and had so often been met with repulsion. They never even had that chance now to feel the disgust and the fear of the humans above, their brother was a wrecking ball of honor and duty that kept them apart. It made it easy to hate him, to blame him for what they couldn't have. How would they ever have the chance to find out if Leonardo denied them that?

Rage is potent when it is blind and fast, a fist in the mouth from a shattered dream. But the fire dies and leaves with it an emptiness much greater than the anger. It is the slow anger that builds, gaining momentum until it is implacable, unstoppable, unbeatable. That was why they never won against Leo. They could never ever be as angry as he was.

Raphael tried but didn't have the stomach for it. In truth, he was frightened of his brother. He was frightened of the control that single being had on his existence and in turn was terrified at the thought of what might happen should he lose it. Fear had gripped Raphael for most of his life, deep down inside the darkest parts of his heart where he knew without being told that there was something inherently _wrong_ with them. That they never should have been, no matter how smart Donnie was or how funny Mike was or how perfect Leo was.

They played pretend, played that they weren't so different from the people in the television and that it wasn't so bad that they lived in a sewer. It might have taken the others longer to realize the truth behind the fact that they lived in the refuse and the feces of the rest of the world, but Raphael had known as a child. They were different and it scared him. Fight or flight and he chose fight. So he swung his punches and his temper at what he feared the most and these days it was his brother, or that absolutely unimaginable lack of him holding back the world that was so frightening. Raphael could only maintain bouts of rage, quick to come and quick to go, leaving him shaky and confused. In the end it was always Leo that won out, holding him tightly within the protection of their circle, unwilling to let him feel the full sting of the real world. His savior and his babysitter. God, how he hated him.

On some level they all did, even Mike who loved everything. Michelangelo was not as blind to reality as he so often pretended. He knew he brother protected them, viciously protected them, and that was a constant in their lives. But sometimes even the baby doesn't want to be safe from the big bad, wants to get a full dose of cruel heartless life straight in the face just so that he knows that he's really alive. Sometimes when your world is a lair beneath the earth with four others that are just as ostracized as you are, you want the chance to see if you can make things change. And when you try, that is invariably where life gets complicated and you end up hitting your big brother in the face, and you know in just a moment you're going to get your ass kicked. And damn it, it's worth it.

The second punch had to come from Mike because he'd started this and if there was anything that they had learned in their lives together was that once you started something, you finished it. If you screw up, do it right. He couldn't walk away and if he tried to leave without going through the motions, it would be doing an injustice to Leo. As much as he might hate the power that Leo had over them, Mike could appreciate that someone had to do it. Because if it was Raph or Don trying to do what he was trying to do now and there was no Leo to stop them, he'd be beside himself. It was alright when his brothers were bullied and beaten, shamed and blamed until they were screaming in frustration. At least they were still alive right? Still there with him and safe. But when it was Michelangelo himself, where the hell did Leo get off deciding their lives for him? So of course he hit Leo a second time, his brother's eyes boring into him with an odd gleam as he took a blow that should have left him dazed. It was Mike's choice and he was going to make it for himself.

Only he hadn't. Leo had already made it for him.

Don watched as his older brother swung, wondering for the thousand and twenty-fourth time just how Leo managed to move that fast. Or how he had let Mike hit him at all considering he could move that fast. Or how much it was going to hurt when the youngest went sprawling on the floor, knocked completely down from one punch. Leonardo might be slim but he could hit just as hard as Raphael. Mike might have hit twice but Leo only needed to hit once. It was over before it ever even truly began.

"You're not going, Mikey," Leonardo said through gritted teeth as his brother's shell met the wall. "No one is."

"That's not up to you, Leo!" Mike cried out, although by the frustrated tears in his eyes, this was almost over anyway. "We owe it to her…we have to."

"What they do topside has nothing to do with us, Mike," Leonardo said quietly, not quite coldly. "That's not the way to remember her."

"And hiding down here is? Like she meant nothing?"

"We'll go there at night, when it's safe."

"You're a coward, Leo." The words were spit out like a curse, and the youngest brother turned away, disappearing into the Lair. The others slowly followed. If they felt the same, they didn't say it. The figurehead of their resistance had already spoken. There was nothing left to say.

* * *

The city is different in the light. The smog and the traffic are thicker, the air hotter and more suffocating. People move about their lives with even more callousness and self absorption, determined that this day is the one where they will make it. They stomp on their families and their coworkers and their friends, climbing the ladder of success, to what ends? To get to stand in on the top floor, in a building of steel, wrapped tightly away from the rest of the underlings. The underfoot. The forgotten. The day is for the winners, the cold and the lifeless. Those already at the pinnacle. The uncaring. The night is for the rest of them, still alive, still hoping for more, waiting for this ever hardening world to soften, just once, just for them. After the harshness of the day, the cool dark spreads over the city, blanketing the wounds like a soft breath. The streets pulse with the by-products of the day's failure, and these things, the lust and the love and the momentary pleasures are the real blood of New York. They are the refuge from reality for the many. The life of the city is during the night.

Perhaps that is why they bury their dead during the day.

It is different here in the light, with no shadows to hide behind. It takes more skill and more luck to move around without being seen. It takes more courage as well. Courage was something that the woman before him had never lacked, and it showed on her face still, up until the moment that they shut that coffin. The humans laid her to rest, in a way that felt befitting to them. Beneath the protection of his coat and hat, Leonardo felt the ceremony…lacking.

There were tears here, but did any of these humans know her? Really know her? Did they know that she cried during Casablanca every single time, and that she hid behind a bag of popcorn so that no one would notice? Or that she clucked her tongue three times in a row when she was upset? Or that she loved them, those freaks down below, and would have done anything for them, including give her life for them? Did these humans know that they shouldn't be the ones burying her, that the only reason they were allowed that honor was out of Leonardo's fear for his brothers' safety? Of course not. A tall one in a leather overcoat just checked his watch. She was just an inconvenience to that man, an extended lunch break, a bouquet of pricey flowers.

_She was our world_.

Mikey fought to be here. Raph and Don backed him silently, but Leonardo had held firm. They thought it was about safety, but it wasn't. It was about a wristwatch, and a cheap casket, and people standing up to describe a life that they had never even known. Not really. It was a preacher that yawned twice, yellow roses even though she hated that color, and a fool in a trench coat in the back row crying silently because he couldn't save her from this. She had deserved better than this moment. It would have sent Raphael into a rage, embittered Michelangelo, and shattered Donatello's already broken heart. No, it was better they didn't see this for what it was. Better they remember her their way, not the way these humans would have them do.

He was the last one to leave, his face hidden in the shadows of his hat, in the open and more at risk then he'd ever been in his life. Still he turned his back to the city, leaving himself exposed for attack, for capture, for death. He turned his back and faced her grave, hand on the dirt, the only true tears to fall that day. The only real devastating loss. Leonardo paid his respects the only way he could, with all his heart and all his grief. A silent apology for a lifetime of things, including that this was all she was given. A moment, just one, but she would have understood. She always did. And she didn't mind the others weren't there. She'd understand why, especially now, that Leonardo had to protect them. His rage was palpable. They could never end up like this. They could never end up like her. They might hate him, but he would always be the barrier between this kind of pain and cruelty, between them and the world above. Even between them and April. He had to be. He _had_ to. That was the way it was, and there was no moving Leonardo.

No matter how many times they hit him.


	2. Chapter 2

Untitled Companion fic to "In Between", Rated M for a single scene

* * *

There's a knife to her throat, and the thug holding her captive has a grin on his face, like he knows he's got me cornered, helpless. He has no idea that he's going to die if that so much as _scratches_ her neck.

I might kill him anyway.

This was supposed to be our first date, and what a date it's turned out to be. April doesn't look scared as much as she looks peeved off. She's been in much worse than this before, although it never tops her list have her life threatened when she's got better things to do. It's her own fault really. I didn't need the hotdog and while it was sweet of her to go into the open to go get it, it wasn't necessary. She knew I saw that kid steal her purse, and even though he took off to the other side of the street from where I was hiding in the shadows, she also knew that in a matter of minutes I would have caught up to him anyway. She shouldn't have gone running after him to get it back, and she certainly shouldn't have followed him into that alley. But April has never lacked courage, it's something that I love and respect about her, even if it does get her in over her head sometimes.

There were more of the kid's friends hiding in that alley, waiting for him to get back. Maybe a gang initiation. Maybe just some common street rats trying to get enough money to eat, or to get drunk, or to fix tonight. Whoever they were, it stopped mattering when after April landed a nice solid kick to her mugger, was grabbed from behind and wound up with a knife to her throat at the same moment I dropped into the scene from above.

"Let her go," I growled, the cool weight of my bo staff in my hands. The thug's eye widened, then narrowed as he stared at me. April let out a yelp as he gripped her tighter and she looked even more ticked off.

"What the hell are you?" he demanded, backing up a step so that their backs were to a dumpster. I wasn't up for telling the story. In fact, the only thing I was up for at the moment was getting his _fucking hands off her_. I kept one eye on him and another on the other three that had begun flanking me.

"Someone who had bigger plans tonight then you, so let her go and I won't hurt you. If you don't, however…" I meant it, although he seemed to doubt that I could back up the unspoken threat there. One of his buddies laughed.

"Kinda outnumbered, aren't you, monster?" the mugger asked with a bark of a laugh. It was just a kid, barely old enough to be in high school.

"Let her go," I tell them one more time, shifting my grip on my staff. Knife boy grinned and squeezed her breast.

_Bad move asshole_.

The next few seconds were a blur for everyone but me. I saw the outraged look in April's eye and knew she was going to try to break out of the thug's hold even as she moved. Not very smart considering that she was at the wrong angle and only managed to slide sideways in his grip, the switchblade barely missing her skin. By the time the others saw me move, I had already closed the distance and landed a hard enough blow to April's attacker to knock him back five feet into the brick alley wall. April stumbled sideways and lost her balance, ungracefully clunking her head hard against the metal dumpster lip. I was already spinning in a circle, my bo knocking all three down at once when I saw her falling. I barely managed to snag her before she hit pavement, eyes rolling back in her head. Movement in the corner of my eye, towards us, towards _her_…I didn't think. I just acted.

That's probably why the blow broke his neck this time.

I grabbed up April and cursed, realizing what I had done. The other three were only stunned, not injured. They'd realize pretty quick what happened. They'd seen both of our faces but I didn't have the heart to kill three kids just because of that. Time to get both of us out of here and hope they're too scared to stick around knife boy. I snagged her purse as I pulled her into the shadows. One helluva way to start a first date.

* * *

April groaned as she came to, and she shifted in my arms.

"Hold on," I murmured to her. "We're almost home."

"Donnie, what…?" she must have realized that we were moving without her legs working. "Why are you carrying me?"

"You bumped your head, April. We're almost to your apartment, just relax."

"I can walk, please set me down." She always did hate to be treated like she was fragile. Normally I would have argued, if just for the chance to play rescuer for her, but my arms were growing tried. I paused in a shadowy doorway and eased her gently to her feet. She wobbled unsteadily, her hand on my arm and hip against mine for balance.

"Do you see any stars, any bright spots or dark ones?" I immediately went into physician mode. Mostly out of concern, but I would be lying if I didn't admit that the way her body was close to me was making me nervous. This was more contact than I was used to.

"Just a pounding headache," April groaned, rubbing her temples gingerly. "Tell me the person responsible is hurting just as much. Please?"

I gave her a tiny grin, my arm around her waist to keep her steady. Like the curve of her breast against my bicep was the furthest thing from my mind. "You know it," I reassured her. Most definitely they would all be waking up with much worse headaches than hers. I had already decided that April didn't need to know that the knife wielder would never be waking up. I didn't like death, none of us did. But I was trained to kill when necessary, and in that moment I had deemed it necessary. April or him? April all the way.

"Good," she gave me a smile in returned, which turned into a rueful grimace as she leaned heavier into me. "They got me good, huh?" _More than you know, baby_.

"Come on," I told her. "We need to get you home, and into a bottle of aspirin."

"That sounds wonderful, Donnie. Make it a double."

She let me support her all the way back to the apartment building, but insisted that she was okay enough to go through the front door herself. I don't think that she wanted to scale the fire escape with that bad of a headache, even if I was the one doing all the work. I reluctantly agreed, although I hated her leaving my sight. April went through the front and I went through the back. The minute and a half it took her get to her apartment door was the longest of my life.

Have I mentioned before how incredibly worried I get about her when she's hurt? Raph says I go overboard. Mikey calls me obsessive. Leo just nods as if he understands completely, which for some reason irritates me far more than the other two. But I can't help it. April is…April. And I can't stand it when something bad happens to her, especially when it's because we didn't manage to keep her safe. I'm also a bit ticked off. I had planned this night so perfectly. If only the kid could've picked another weaker woman to mug, or if April had remembered that going in a dark alley alone was _stupid_…

"Stop it, Don," April waggled a finger as she opened the window for me. I slipped through, raising an eyebrow at her. "You have that look."

"Look?" I play dumb even though I'm not, peering into each beautiful green eye to check for pupil response time. She probably has a concussion. "What look? The one that says that you knew better than what you chose to do tonight?"

April had the grace to blush and she stepped back from my inspection. Then she stuck her tongue out at me. "Girls can fight back, too," she reminded me, disappearing into the kitchen. "That's why you guys have been training me."

I followed her, watching her grab a cold pack out of the freezer and press it to her head before turning back around.

"No, sensei has instructed us to train you for your _defense_, April. Not so you can charge in like that." I looked at her seriously. "You knew I would get your purse back, and that there was no reason to follow like that."

April leaned back against the sink and stared at her feet. Finally her eyes came back to mine. God, she was beautiful.

"I know," she admitted. "But it was kind of…"

"Kind of what?" I pressed, taking a step closer to her. April didn't finish her sentence for a moment.

"Embarrassing," she finally said, flushing prettily. "I mean, we were having such a nice time and then I manage to get myself mugged. The last thing I wanted was for you to have to go rescue me when I was just buying a freaking hotdog…"

I didn't say anything, but I did step even closer, so that I was standing before her. The bruise on her forehead was starting to darken, and I gently removed the icepack from her hand, setting it down on the countertop beside her. Then I took her face in my hands, very gently, and kissed her. It was a light kiss, soft and sweet and very much unlike the passionate kisses that had occurred the other night. The night we stopped pretending we were just friends.

"Maybe I like rescuing you," I told her, shifting her backwards so that she was caught between me and the sink.

"You shouldn't have to, Donnie," April murmured, eyes half closed and licking her lips. "I need to be able to take care of myself--"

I cut her off by kissing her again. April melted against me, into the kiss.

"You can, April," I agreed between kisses. "But when it's just us? You don't have to be strong all the time."

"No?" Her arms were around my neck, pulling my torso closer to her. "You shouldn't have to protect me. Especially on our first date, Don. I can't remember a time when I didn't have to take care of myself." I pulled back, breathing heavily. Trying to regain control. First date, that's right. There's a good night kiss, not a full make out session in the kitchen. Then her words sank in and a tiny growl left my throat. One hand still on her face and one at her waist, I tugged her back to me.

"April?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm taking care of things tonight. So be quiet and let me kiss you."

* * *

Somehow the guy I'd met in a sewer, a mutated turtle that only vaguely resembled a human, had become the hottest thing alive. The kitchen had only been the start of it. I'm usually very good about following the dating rules. Don't kiss until the second date, don't mess around until the fifth, but this was Donnie. My Don: whom I'd spent years talking to and laughing with and crying against. I knew him, how he spoke and what he liked and what he worried about in the silence of his own mind. But this Don…this Don was looking at me in a way that no one had ever looked at me before. The sheer intensity of those eyes was making me shiver.

And the way he was kissing me…

I know the dating rules but I had long since tossed them out the window tonight. Maybe it was part of the adrenaline from before, or the fact that it _was_ sexy that Don had rescued my stupid self. I didn't fight him when he pulled me towards the couch, hands moving across my body. He didn't fight me when an hour later I pulled him towards the bedroom. Turning point, folks. Sometimes right is just right, and we'd spent a long time pretending that this wasn't what we both wanted.

He stopped us before it went too far. I wonder at that, because I could see in his eyes that he wanted more. That he wanted all of me. His excuse was that he wanted to do that when I didn't have a possible concussion, and would not have the chance of not remembering in the morning. I told him he was a big idiot, but I'd keep him around anyway.

* * *

"Donnie?" April's voice was slurred with sleepiness, like she had spoken even before she was really awake. She reached towards the side of the bed that I had slept on, where I had held her in my arms until a few hours ago. When she didn't contact anything but blanket, April sat up, blinking in the dim light that crept around the curtains. "Don?"

"I'm here," I told her quietly from my place across the room. She looked over at me, obviously confused. I didn't blame her. I was sitting cross-legged on a chair in the corner, where it was cold and solitary, unlike her nice warm bed.

"You okay?" she asked uncertainly, shifting uncomfortably as she realized she was naked from the waist up. April tugged the blanket up to cover her chest, slightly embarrassed. I tried to avert my eyes for the sake of her modesty, but the way the fabric drooped left the side of her breast uncovered, reminding me just how much I loved to look at her body. Finally I gave up and just smiled crookedly at her.

"M'fine." By the tilt of her head I could tell she didn't buy it.

"It's cold…" April shivered, suddenly noticing the way the temperature had dropped. "Wanna come back over here?" There was a touch of vulnerability in her voice, as if she thought I might not want to. I did want to. I wanted to lie in that bed and hold her forever, but for some reason I was sitting over here. Not moving when a gorgeous undressed woman asks me back to her bed. My hesitation hurt her, I could see that instantly. She bit her lower lip and her eyes refused to meet mine.

"Never mind," she muttered, slipping back down in bed. "Listen, if you've got to go that's fine, Don. I know you have practice and all...you don't have to stay on my account-" I smoothly cut her off.

"Have you ever waited for something for so long, wanted and wished and hoped for something so badly, that when you finally get it, you have absolutely no idea what to do?"

April sat back up, green eyes on me. I looked down at my hands where they gripped my bo staff across my lap.

"Have you ever needed…?" I drifted off then came back into focus. "Last night was incredible, April."

"Then why are you over there instead of being over here with me?"

I had no good answer for that. A shy turtle at best, this situation was beyond me. I knew where I _should_ be. A slim hand touched mine. I looked up at the woman standing before me.

"Don." Fingers entwined, she drew me to my feet. "Everything's okay. Come back to bed." I allowed myself to be pulled back to the warm blankets that I had fled not too long ago. April settled her back against my plastron, sighing contentedly as my arms went around her. _She was so small_.

"That's better. Hold me tighter, Donnie?" she requested, and I complied. She hummed happily and closed her eyes.

"You won't leave again?" April breathed as she drifted back to sleep.

"Never."

* * *

I loved how she felt in my arms. I loved how she felt against my skin. I loved how she moaned and begged for me when I took her. _I loved her_.

* * *

"Hey Donnie, you actually going to stay around tonight?" Mike asked me teasingly as I shut down my computer. "Oh wait, I forgot. You don't stay around now that you have April. I think your computer is suffering from separation anxiety."

"Har har." It was pretty true, though. Mike wasn't done.

"April…oh April! All my internet porn never even came close to how hot you are!" The sentence was followed by loud smooching and smacking noises as my brother did a disturbingly accurate display of making out with himself.

"Shuddup," I playfully growled, but I couldn't help the smile that came to my face.

"When are you proposing, bro?" Mike couldn't help but tease. I just swatted him on the top of his head as I walked past his chair.

"I'm not going to press my luck," I told him. "Can you think of a better way of terrifying off my girlfriend?"

The knowing smile on his face should've clued me off that he knew more than I ever did about how she felt.

* * *

"I love you," I choke out in a ragged whisper, shuddering as I move deep inside of her. April lets out a soft moan and moves against me, quivering as I take her in long deliberate strokes.

"Donnie..." April barely manages to get out my name as I shift, arm beneath her hips as I lift her up so she has to accept more of me. _Dear god…please never let this end._ I bite her neck possessively, relishing in this feeling of taking something so much more beautiful and delicate then I am. The animal in me wants to pound into her until I release. The lover in me wants to hear her scream out my name and writhe helplessly before I do. I'm going to get my wish on both accounts. I get to feel her shudder around me before I end this. Finally I collapse against her, face on her breast, heart racing. She wraps her arms around my neck and laughs, a soft sound of such happiness, of a happiness that I've given her.

"April--" I start to whisper as I pull her into my arms, but she cuts me off.

"I love you too, Donatello."

* * *

There's a knife to her throat, but this time I know that I can't get there in time. I feel frozen, locked in time. He's grinning like he's won, and I realize that he's right. She's smiling that brave little smile of hers, the one that says that she doesn't regret a single minute of it, and I know that I would give every single second back to have her anywhere but here. My brothers will tell me later that I never quit trying to get to her…that I screamed her name and fought like a demon even long after she had slid to the ground in a pool of her own blood. They tell me that there was nothing more I could have done. It will take me years to even consider that they are right. They tell me I killed him. It doesn't matter. I've killed for her before and would do it again.

It doesn't bring her back to me.

* * *

"I'm going, Leo. I have to."

"No, you're _not_. You're not going, Mikey. No one is."

"That's not up to you, Leo! We owe it to her…we have to."

"What they do topside has nothing to do with us, Mike. That's not the way to remember her."

_Are you sure, Leo? Is seeing her dying in my arms any better?_

* * *

Somewhere up there is a gravestone with her name on it. But I saw the look in Leo's eyes when he slipped back into the lair today, and maybe he was right. Maybe we don't need to see anymore than we've already had to see. Not when it comes to her. _I loved you, April. I always will_.

* * *

Silently I turn my computer back on.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N Never planned on this going so far, but all the nice reviews have encouraged the story. So why not? This is for you guys, the ones that wanted more. Hmmmm…be careful what you wish for. This is shorter, and it's getting darker. Had to up the rating officially after this one.

* * *

Twelve days, five hours, and sixteen minutes after I watched her bleed out in my brother's arms, I finally lost it. I couldn't tell you why it took me that long. All I know is that one moment I was standing there scrubbing burnt bacon drippings out of the frying pan, and the next I was bent over the sink, forehead against the faucet, sobbing.

I haven't cried since I was nine, when I watched my little brother Mike scream in pain while my injured father dug glass shards out of his son's arm. They had both been covered in blood. I was sure that they were both going to die then, how could they not with that much blood? I had run to the kitchen and hid inside the pantry, willing the screaming to be over, bawling my eyes out. If they died, I didn't know what I would do. Now I know. When they die, you can do _nothing_.

I'm still hiding in the kitchen, waiting for the screaming to stop.

* * *

It took Donnie ten days to snap out of the silent trance he'd been in. During those ten days, I had decided that if I could just hear my brother speak, just one more time, then everything would be okay. His hurt had taken him so deep inside himself…but he was strong. He'd come back out, eventually. When he was ready. And I wouldn't have to force him to eat, or to drink. Or to live. He'd come back. He did, too. Donnie came back to us, but it was nothing like any of us had expected. He lost it. One minute he was sitting on the couch, head bent, eyes closed, and the next he had had Leo by the throat. He had pinned him against the wall, screaming at him. The words were incomprehensible, but the meaning wasn't lost.

Nor was the reason behind it when Donatello attacked his brother like he wanted him to die.

* * *

"Raph?" Leo's voice was outside my door, and I quickly brushed the tears from reddened eyes. "Can I come in?"

"Yeah…" My voice cracked as I spoke, and at any other time I would have been embarrassed by it. But the events of the last few days had left me so raw, so wounded that I didn't care. Leonardo slipped inside my room, closing the door and leaning his shell back against it. He looked exhausted, his skin a paler green that resembled Don more than himself. When had he gotten those lines that creased his face, making him look so much older?

"You okay?" Leo asked softly. I just shook my head, looking down.

"I think he was trying to get you to kill him," I whispered, staring at my hands. Hands that had shed so much blood themselves, and yet hers was all that mattered.

"I think it would have been an easy way to stop his pain." Leonardo's voice was harsh, harsh enough to make my head jerk up. My eyes narrowed.

"But we can't have that, now, can we?" I murmured sarcastically.

"Would you rather I have done it?" my brother asked suddenly, his eyes gleaming in the dim light. "Perhaps I should. He's already had his heart ripped out of his chest, what's a ninjaken through the gut afterwards?"

"You don't mean that."

"Don't I?"

"No. You don't let any of us take the easy way out, brother. Not even Donnie, not even now."

The statue that was Leonardo remained still for a long time, then slowly he sank down to the floor, his shell scraping the wood behind him as he did.

"What do you want from me, Raph?" Leo demanded roughly, his voice thickening with emotion. "You want me to lie to you and tell you that everything's going to be okay? It's not. April was the one thing that Don ever wanted for himself. He was happy, Raphael, truly happy. And he had it torn away from him. He knows what happened couldn't have been prevented by anything other than her _not_ loving him back, and that's shredding him up inside. Don is a mess, and there's nothing any of us can do about it."

"You're not even trying," I hissed, suddenly furious with him. "It's like you don't even care!"

"Of course I do!" Leonardo came back, and I realized that his eyes were glistening. "But I also understand that his choices, our whole family's choices, caused this to happen. Don't you see? April's dead because it mattered more to us to have a friend, then to make sure that person was safe. Donatello cared more that he was in love, than what his love might do to her. She wasn't just _his_ fix, Raph. She was all of our fixes. And we used until she ended up…"

He broke off, turning his face away from me. Tears ran openly down his beak, but his voice was once more harsh. "April's dead. We killed her by our association. Don killed her by being her lover. And I don't think any of us deserve to feel 'better' about it. There shouldn't be any easy way to stop the pain. If he wants out, he knows what to do."

"Seppuku?" My jaw dropped, then snapped back shut. "There's no way that Splinter would allow it."

"He wouldn't have a choice, Raphael. The dishonor is on the entire clan. He would hate it…but he would allow it." His voice went very soft, as if I wasn't even in the room. "If he wants redemption, he knows what to do. "

I stared at him for a very long time, before Leonardo finally met my eyes.

"The dishonor is on the entire clan, brother," he repeated quietly, as if trying to get me to understand. I did. I hated it. I hated him right then, too.

"Don't you dare, Leo," I said through gritted teeth, desperately fighting panic. "Don't you _dare_."

He exhaled softly, then offered me a tiny smile.

"Stop worrying, Raph. You worry too much."

"You just implied--!" I started heatedly, but he cut me off.

"May I sleep in here tonight? I don't really want to be alone." Leo was all over the place tonight, and his rapid subject changes were throwing me off. For a minute it was silent in the room, with only my ragged gasps for air audible. Then down the hall, I could hear Don crying, softly. Maybe it was Mikey. It was hard to tell. Letting my face fall into my arms, I just shrugged.

"…Yeah. Okay. You take the hammock."

But Leo didn't answer. He was already asleep against the door, a barrier between me and the pain outside. I tried not to sleep, even though my eyes were closed. I just tried to memorize the way he sounded as he breathed. Just in case…just in case the rest of my world was going to collapse.

* * *

_"I'm dating Donatello," April said with a proud defiant look. "So…there."_

_Mike's jaw dropped, then split into the hugest grin I had ever seen from him. Don was blushing a deep red, but couldn't take his eyes off of her. I glanced at Leo. He wasn't watching April, or Don. He was watching me. Watching my reaction. I shrugged. What the heck, let the two finally stop pining after each other. So I smiled at Don and April, wondering why Leo was still looking at me. Or why he seemed so damn sad right now. But the deep bow he gave to the new couple hid whatever emotion that might have shown through, as our leader gave his consent. As our leader slipped out the window to go inform our sensei what he had allowed to happen._

* * *

I waited, I tailed him, and I listened in on his conversations with Splinter. But whatever Leo had meant that night seemed to be lost beneath the angry cries of my brother, as he vented his pain on Leo in the dojo. I watched the eldest hold Don as he sobbed, telling him he loved him. I don't think it mattered to Don. His love was all used up, locked in a box beneath the dirt, never to come back again. His capacity for love was destroyed, along with his heart. Leo told him he loved him anyways, knowing that Don would strike out again, and over and over. Raging…raging…at the only physical thing we had to rage against, the only thing between us and this terrible world.

Leo loved him anyways.

* * *

The scent of blood woke me. Not just a little blood. A LOT of blood. I don't remember rolling off the couch, sais in hand. I don't remember the sprint from the living room to where the metallic tang was the sharpest. I don't remember what Mike was yelling or if Donatello made it into the hall before retching violently. I only remember sliding to my knees, clutching my weapons like they were the only thing that gave me strength anymore. I only remember meeting my father's tear filled eyes as he bowed to me, junin, the new leader of our clan after him. I only remember him cradling his dead son's head in his lap, as if he was a child once more.

"Our clan is now restored of its honor," father whispers brokenly, but proudly. "Hamato Leonardo has given it back."

_Damn you, Leo. You took the easy way out._

Should there have been this much blood? He did it twice, two crossing cuts, so much more painful…how did his ninjaken cut through his plastron when it was so tough? The weapon wasn't made for that kind of use. He must have had to saw through…I was throwing up, dry heaves leaving me shaking. Oh god, Leo. What did you do for us? I never even heard him cry out. There was nothing easy about this. Nothing. And still…that gentle smile, the one he had when he said he loved us. He loved us. _He loved us. _

* * *

_Leonardo paid his respects the only way he could, with all his heart and all his grief. A silent apology for a lifetime of things, including that this was all she was given. A moment, just one, but she would have understood. She always did. And she didn't mind the others weren't there. She'd understand why, especially now, that Leonardo had to protect them. His rage was palpable. They could never end up like this. They could never end up like her. They might hate him, but he would always be the barrier between this kind of pain and cruelty, between them and the world above. Even between them and April. He had to be. He had to. That was the way it was, and there was no moving Leonardo. _

_There was no moving Leonardo._

* * *

I'm twenty two, not nine, but I'm still in the kitchen. I'm still waiting for the screaming to stop. I don't know until Mikey grabs me and holds on for dear life that the screaming is coming from me.


	4. Chapter 4

Mikey hit Leo yesterday. Today he wishes he could take it back.

Don't we all.

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Shortest chapter ever? Lol. I loved playing with the formatting on this thing. Not really a chapter, but it needed to be said. I've never written something that was as piecy and disjointed as this was. Kinda fun. But now this is over. For reals, this time. :)


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